Rehabilitation of a fearful dental patient with oral sedation: utilizing the incremental oral administration technique.

The treatment of fearful or anxious patients presents a myriad of problems for the dentist. In-office sedation using oral (enteral) medications is an effective means of increasing patient tolerance of invasive dental procedures. The incremental oral administration technique is a protocol that can be utilized to treat fearful or anxious patients. A case is presented in which this technique was used as an adjunct to the rehabilitation of a debilitated mouth.